If you sort the qualified American League starting pitchers by ground ball rate, this is the list you end up with:

1. Trevor Cahill

2. Justin Masterson

3. Fausto Carmona (His fake name is too cool to stop using it)

4. Ricky Romero

5. Ivan Nova

6. Rick Porcello

7. Carl Pavano

8. Jon Lester

9. Felix Hernandez

10. Luke Hochevar

It’s not exactly a who’s who of AL aces, but it’s a list of some pretty solid pitchers. For the most part, guys that nearly any team would love to have on their staff. Our own Luke Hochevar makes the list along with a couple of elite pitchers. So why is it that Hochevar ranks 8th on the list in ERA and 7th on the list in xFIP? We all know that Hochevar is good at inducing ground balls, but he isn’t utilizing that skill to help him become a more elite pitcher. What makes him different from the guys on that list who are putting it all together.

One thing that jumps to mind is that he might be walking too many guys. While Luke isn’t exactly the stingiest with his walks, on this list he ranks 5th. Right in the middle. Sure he’s below Felix Hernandez, but he’s just below Justin Masterson and well above Jon Lester. It’s something I’d like to see Hochevar improve upon, but it isn’t absolutely critical.

The best way to ensure an at-bat ends in an out is to not let the guy leave the batters box. Strike a man out and there’s almost no chance he scores a run. Once the list of 10 is sorted by K/9 ratio, you start to see a more organized list of who is the most effective. Felix Hernandez and Jon Lester top the list and Luke Hochevar ranks 6th. Not terrible, but he’s hanging around a few too many 4+ ERA guys, it’s not the kind of company we wish our man to keep.

The comparison to Justin Masterson seems good for Hochevar. I’m pretty sure he isn’t turning into Hernandez or Lester, but can he be Masterson? I don’t see why not. They seem very similar in styles of pitching and Masterson is just a tad better than Hochevar in all of these important categories. In terms of strikeouts, once again Hochevar is only 2 slots below him, however Masterson strikes out 0.75 more men every 9 innings than Hochevar. That is significant. Hochevar has a 5.82 K/9 rate and it seems that there is a real inflection point at about 6 to 6.25 K/9 for these players. If you can surpass that mark, combined with a great ground ball rate and effectiveness takes a giant leap.

What I’ve been looking at though so far is the entire season of 2011 and if you watched last year you know that there were two distinct versions of Luke Hochevar. The first half, aka “not good” version and the second half version. How does 2nd half Luke compare to the guys on this list?

The first thing is that his ground ball rate dropped precipitously in the 2nd half of the season. It’s possible that he took a look at the rather large dimensions at Kauffman and decided that he could allow more fly balls, but only if it helped him in another area, likely strikeouts. Did it work?

Luke Hochevar’s K/9 during the first half: 4.6

Luke Hochevar’s K/9 during the second half: 7.7

Yeah, I’d say that the tradeoff worked handsomely. The results bear it out as well since he dropped going into the All-Star game he had a 5.46 ERA and in the second half he posted a 3.52 ERA. A 7.7 K/9 rate would have crushed Justin Masterson’s 6.57 and would have surpassed guys like Dan Haren and Jared Weaver as well. That kind of strike out rate is bordering on elite, particularly combined with a high ground ball rate.

Unfortunately, the Luke who has found the Force and is able to strike guys out also came with the whiney ineffective Luke from Tatooine who allowed his family to get slaughtered by the Empire. We need the confident Luke who has the ability to fool is enemies into swinging and missing. Can he be that guy in 2012 or will he revert to his old self?

I don’t think Luke Hochever an important guy in the teams ability to contend in 2012. I think he’s THE most important player on the team. If Luke has the Force, the Royals can absolutely contend. If he doesn’t they might not stand a chance.

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Comments

Written by Fred about 4 years ago.

Hochevar is our horse. He has to come through. The rotation is setup with no room for error. Texas has quality depth, KC has back of rotation depth. Luke has to seperate himself this year for the Royals and himself.

I love how Dayton comes out saying they won’t make a counter move to the Prince signing. Really? Is there a Royals fan in the world that thought they would? I’m wondering if Gordon is gonna get locked up at this point.

Money for a rotation upgrade? I can find 5 million in 2 seconds. The horrible year that Davies had in 2010 parlayed him into a double pay $3mil deal when he should have been dfa’d, and now the $2mil Yuni gets to try and play 2nd base. All the little dumb deals Dayton makes add up if you are squeezing payroll with 2 hands.

Written by Ted about 4 years ago.

I actually agree with Jim’s comment from the last post: if Paulino pitches at or near the level he did during his 120 innings with us last summer, he becomes a legitimate top-of-the-rotation guy; not an ace, certainly, but a strong #2 pitcher like a Yovanni Gallardo or Shawn Marcum (both of whom he compared favorably with last summer). If he can do that and consistently get through 6+ innings, he will be our staff ace.

Then things look brighter. Everything about our rotation is a question mark, but they almost cannot help but be better than last season. I still do not see a jump to 500 this season, but I do not think it is far out of reach. Just a bit more consistently decent pitching from Hoch, just a bit more shades of 2010 from Sanchez, and suddenly we have three relatively dependable starters. Look what MN was able to do for so many seasons with guys like Blackburn and Pavano and an inconsistent Liriano and an inconsistent Scott Baker…it is possible to compete in the Central without overwhelming pitching. I think Detroit has changed that over the past couple years, and they continue to be heavy favorites, but a productive offense and middling pitching can take a team far in this division, if not the playoffs.

Written by Zack Daddy about 4 years ago.

Aaaargh.

I think if Luke can stay near an ERA of 4, we should be happy. That gives our offense and bullpen a LOT of chance to win ball games. Same can be said of Paulino, Sanchez and Chen. That gives us a chance (maybe slim and with some luck) at the playoffs, I think, but does not give us a chance once in the playoffs. We don’t have the staff that forces teams to play small ball…yet.

Luke has to step up and be THE guy for KC this year, which he showed he could do in the second half of last season. If he starts off like he did last year, I would assume that this would be his last audition with us.

Written by Axl about 4 years ago.

Somewhere Scott Elarton is jealous Luke will make a 2nd opening day start.

Written by Eric about 4 years ago.

Can Luke go to the dark side and just start mowing people down ala his father in Revenge of the Sith?

Written by Greg about 4 years ago.

I realize this is getting a bit tiresome, but Edwin Jackson is open to one year deals and the Red Sox offered him around 1 yr / 6 million. Now, he hasn’t signed yet and there were certainly rumors of Fielder for one year deals, but if Jackson could be had for under 10 million on a one year deal then it’s gross negligence if the Royals aren’t involved. He would instantly be the most established pitcher in our rotation and the contract could not be argued to effect the long term prospects of the Process (better known as the grow your own and hope philosophy — barring changes).

Written by airgoesit about 4 years ago.

I don’t have a chance to go stat hunting, but from my recollection of fantasy research, Edwin Jackson is not that good of a pitcher. Which probably explains why he doesn’t have a contract yet. He’s as likely to implode for 6 runs in 5 innings as he is to throw a 3 hitter. I can’t figure out what the fascination is and I don’t really believe the ‘waiting for Oswalt to set the market’ crap with him. I think he’s a mediocre pitcher asking for a premium salary.

Written by Axl about 4 years ago.

Jackson is a mediocre pitcher, Oswalt has a bad back, Cespedes is unproven, Darvish will be a bust, Gordon doesn’t deserve an extension…..ok, haven’t heard that one yet. This team is embarrassingly cheap. Don’t expect a deadline deal for anyone that has a market value contract all ready. Glass doesn’t take on salary. Losing 90 games isn’t a problem. People complain about the Royals not being on ESPN or MLB network…well there’s nothing to report!

Luke’s second half was a good sign – seems like he may have figured out what he has to do to be successful. Baseball is a game of adjustments, so let’s see if he can have a full year of success.

The things that puzzled me most about Luke was the outings he had where he would be perfect thru five innings, then gets rung up for fives runs before any outs are recorded. How does that happen???

Written by Abh about 3 years ago.

Yes, if Jackson and Oswalt sign one year deals for under $10m and KC didn’t make a matching offer, I am going to be sorely disappointed.

Written by Greg about 3 years ago.

@airgoesit

I don’t want to make a giant deal of this since the Royals aren’t going to sign him anyway, but Edwin Jackson is not “I think he’s a mediocre pitcher asking for a premium salary.”

ERA is flawed, but simplicity he has an under 4 ERA over the last three seasons combined (ERA+ 109). So, he’s about a 10% better than average and that type of performance makes 10 million or less a great bargain. Not to mention the fact that he would immediately become the best pitcher on our roster and it’s not close. I wouldn’t sign him for 4+ years, but to pretend he doesn’t make this years team better is absolutely, unequivocally ridiculous.

Written by Frosty Maltz about 3 years ago.

I think the days of Royals putting their yearly wave of storm troopers on the mound–only to watch them get destroyed–is almost (so close!) behind us for a long time.

Written by jim fetterolf about 3 years ago.

A couple of other notes, Luke’s HRs dropped and his wild pitches increased. That suggests nastier stuff, fooling both hitters and catchers. His innings per game also rose by about a third in the second half. For our readers who want to look at Luke’s splits:

“I think if Luke can stay near an ERA of 4, we should be happy. That gives our offense and bullpen a LOT of chance to win ball games. Same can be said of Paulino, Sanchez and Chen. ”

Agree. With our bullpen and offense, if the starters can get 6+ innings while giving up 3 or less runs, we’ll win some games.

In my dream world Hoch “gets it”, Paulino throws seven innings in under 120 pitches, Sanchez realizes that duplicating ’10 rather than ’11 is worth tens of millions of dollars to him, Duffy decides to throw something nasty in the zone when he has an 0-2 count, and Master Chen is still Master Chen. I’m still good with 85 wins.

“gets rung up for fives runs before any outs are recorded. How does that happen???”

Luke doesn’t pitch well out of the stretch and one of the Boston coaches told Lee Judge that Luke, when he got in trouble, would rare back and try to throw fastballs by big league hitters. That makes them flatten out and go straight, so he’ld get rung up. Second half of the year he used his slider more and got better at containing the damage.